Comment in Briefs: Month of April

Who are we missing?

When Oliver Daniel, Annie Liu, Kathy Sun, and Jehan Vakharia first proposed the idea of hosting a mental health forum at Innis College in response to the death in the Bahen Centre for Information Technology, I was impressed and delighted. Four first-year students coming together to take action within days of the news spreading gives me hope about the strength of our campus community.

I love the spirited proposition of initiatives, like the implementation of a Mental Health Director and mental health training within Innis, as well as the acknowledgement that there is only so much students can do without the full force of administration and professional resources to back us up.

But there are still important questions to be asked: what will happen to the students who don’t make themselves visible to us, who don’t come to events, who don’t speak out about campus issues, who don’t engage with student groups, and who may not live on or near campus? These are questions fellow student leaders and I deal with on a daily basis.

These students are often not even on the radar of student clubs, unions, and publications. Student leaders may not have the tools or the vocabulary to identify the communities that are missing from their programming. At the same time, these students are often the ones who most need support.

Student leaders and administration at Innis have worked hard this year to push the boundaries of the Innis community farther to encompass more students of diverse backgrounds and interests. But it is not certain if it is enough. If we aren’t even fully aware of who we are missing, it is not clear what our next step should be to ensure that essential services like mental health support reach the students who need it most.

Michelle Zhang is a second-year Peace, Conflict and Justice Studies, Urban Studies, and Political Science student at Innis College.

Disclosure: Zhang served as the 2018—2019 Equity & Outreach Director at the Innis College Student Society.

In defence of the recent provincial changes to education

Since the Ontario government backtracked on controversial changes to its autism programs by making significant concessions and pursuing consultations with parents, I will focus on the recently protested changes to the general public education system. Rather than succumb to the fear-mongering antics of some protesters, we must recognize the benefit of proposed changes to the Ontario public education system, namely the increases to class sizes and mandatory online education.

We’ve come far since the pioneer society of Upper Canada — with non-uniform textbooks and uncertified, often transient, pseudo-educators — to today’s Ontario public education system.

Still, the system is not without faults. Most concerningly, it fails to prepare students to meet the unique challenges and unprecedented scale and rate of socio-economic changes of the age of information technology.

Overloading — if not overburdening — the public system by hiring too many teachers misses the forest for the trees. This ineffective hiring policy has diminishing returns on investment and limits the capacity of public coffers to address the many other systemic and infrastructural problems.

It’s been my experience, from primary through postsecondary education, that the quality of the teachers — not class size — makes for a good or bad learning environment. Increasing classroom size in order to better optimize cost-effectiveness will hopefully maximize use of limited space and resources. At the very least, it will encourage students to be independent and to self-advocate.

Furthermore, mandatory online learning isn’t something to be feared. It is long overdue and must be embraced, especially in a year that marks the 30th anniversary of the World Wide Web. Online learning promotes student independence and responsibility, and holds our province’s limited public resources more accountable.

These changes will maximize the potential of our society’s public education system and better prepare them for an economy that requires more versatile and adaptable lifelong learners.

Gertler’s task force falls short

President Meric Gertler has released a letter following public protests of the University of Toronto’s lacklustre response to recent student suicides. In this letter, he focuses more on applauding the institution’s existing services than admitting to its shortcomings. He highlights so-called achievements such as the provision of thousands of counselling appointments and Accessibility Services’ more than doubling the amount of registered students.

On the surface, the creation of a task force seems to be a step forward. However, upon closer inspection, one will see that two out of four steps of the action plan include strengthening collaboration with healthcare partners and pressuring the provincial government to increase public funding to other sources and institutions. In other words, U of T is still pushing 50 per cent of its recommendations outward.

Other schools have moved in the other direction, reassessing their own services in response to student dissatisfaction. Following the death of three students in one year, most recently on March 5, 2018, the University of Waterloo has responded with a $1.2 million increase in counselling services. University of Waterloo President Feridun Hamdullahpur declared that “we have no time to waste.”

Gertler should take note and respond in a similarly active manner. Because even within this seemingly progressive document, U of T still manages to blame students, declaring an “overwhelming increase in demand” as the reason for its underwhelming response. Directing the focus anywhere but at itself — to students, healthcare partners, the government — does not allow for any fundamental, institutional change to occur. It simply perpetuates the cycle of wilful ignorance that U of T is known for.

U of T’s methods of assigning blame have proven ineffective. It must self-assess and investigate internally in order to truly understand its role in this crisis. It is only in acknowledging its weaknesses that the University of Toronto can effectively provide for the needs of students.

Rose Gulati is a second-year English, Political Science, and Women and Gender Studies student at Trinity College.

The glaring need for more spaces of light

Re: “Robarts Library expansion underway”

A steel structure on the northwest side of Robarts Library. MICHAEL PHOON/THE VARSITY

In the decades since Robarts Library first opened, it has experienced a near doubling of daily visitors. The glaring need to expand and accommodate the growing demand has existed for some time.

While U of T has announced various infrastructural maintenance and expansion projects in recent years, it’s important to also acknowledge that the Robarts Commons is made possible by the generous private donations of supporters from inside and outside the U of T community.

Now that construction has begun, with an anticipated opening in 2020, let us pause to reflect on what this project means going forward, in order to sincerely express our gratitude to those donors whose support made this project possible.

The renewal project isn’t merely adding more study spaces. It is also an architectural expansion for more spaces of light, which this campus also has a glaring need for, especially in Robarts.

For those of us who study at Robarts in the winter, the lack of spaces of light can contribute to the prevalence of seasonal affective disorder (SAD), which literally darkens students’ mood. While Robarts does offer SAD light therapy lamps to help students, they’re merely a band-aid solution.

What students really need and what this project aims to deliver is more spaces of light, including natural light. Light fosters hope and optimism and in turn a positive learning environment.

The Robarts Commons was designed by Diamond Schmitt Architects. While I’m not very familiar with their work, my favourite architect, Santiago Calatrava, whose world-renowned work known for its awe-inspiring expressions of elegance, revealed that the motivating force driving his work was a constant “searching for more light and space.”

Robarts’ lack of spaces with light was always on my mind whenever I considered studying there. But from what I’ve seen in the artistic renderings and depictions of how the Robarts Commons will look, I’d imagine it would get a stamp of approval from Calatrava himself, and I can’t wait to take it all in.

Calling U of T out for another death at Bahen Centre

On Sunday, March 17, a student died by suicide at the Bahen Centre for Information Technology. The death was followed by student protests that criticized the U of T administration for its inadequate response and lack of mental health resources. Below, three students provide brief responses to The Varsity’s news coverage of the death and the protests that followed.

A lifeless response from the administration

Following what the University of Toronto has placidly deemed the “incident,” which occurred in the Bahen Centre on Sunday, and its lukewarm acknowledgement of the peaceful protests that followed, the administration’s true colours are showing.

In follow-up tweets, U of T has offered nothing but empty platitudes, student services with fatally long wait times, and various unaffiliated hotlines. In short, it is directing students outward — to the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Good2Talk, and the Distress Centre — and washing its own hands of any institutional accountability.

In remaining silent on the crisis of student suicide, U of T simultaneously silences students who suffer. Their continual inaction proves that U of T is more concerned with preserving its “boundless” reputation than addressing a crisis that continues to take lives. After three reported deaths on campus in less than a year, I ask the administration: how many more will it take?

Students have spoken out after watching their peers needlessly suffer, demanding change. Yet U of T changes nothing, instead redirecting students to external partners or to a severely under-resourced Health & Wellness Centre. These practices have proven ineffective; serving only to normalize the issue and incorporate suicide into our university experience, the administration suggests that this is something we should anticipate.

Suicide is totally preventable, and preventative measures are not drastic or expensive. Life-saving changes include increasing the abundance and availability of trained professionals on campus, removing caps on counselling sessions, and dissolving the mandatory-leave policy.

Ensuring the safety of its students should be U of T’s first priority. This begins with acknowledging the ongoing crisis and changing mental health policies to reflect reality.

The University of Toronto must understand that its prized reputation cannot exist if students are not around to maintain it.

Rose Gulati is a second-year English, Political Science, and Women and Gender Studies student at Trinity College.

Say the s-word

It is time for U of T to say the s-word: ‘suicide.’ In the official response to the recent death at Bahen Centre, that word was strikingly absent. Instead, it was euphemistically referred to as “the recent incident.”

We could debate the reasons why ‘suicide’ was absent — fear of liability, bad press, or contagion — but I would rather talk about why it needs to be present.

Suicide is not a dirty word. It is, however, the second-leading cause of death among Canadians aged 10–29. As students, we have been talking about its frequency on campus. But as long as the administration remains afraid to say ‘suicide,’ we are missing out on the many proven opportunities to prevent it.

We do not need to look far for evidence to support this fact. In Toronto, deaths decreased after a barrier was erected on the Bloor Viaduct. There are also plenty of researchers affiliated with the university who study suicide. I work with one of them.

At St. Michael’s Hospital, I am a peer facilitator and co-educator of suicide intervention groups and trainings. In these programs, we have seen how, when we acknowledge suicide, we decrease its association with secrecy and shame and open up opportunities to increase awareness and skills pertaining to coping with emotions and distress, problem-solving, and naming and identifying feelings and needs. Safety planning, for example, is an evidence-based intervention and relatively simple to implement. It helps people recognize warning signs, coping strategies, and support systems.

I would like to see U of T offer safety planning workshops and develop a suicide prevention strategy so that we do not only talk about suicide after the fact. If we can’t name the problem, then we can’t talk about solutions. There are strategies and supports that help; suicide should not have to be the end of anyone’s story.

Gina Nicoll is a third-year Psychology student at Woodsworth College.

We need fundamental change

What is most shocking about the recent deaths on the U of T campus is how few people knew that they had actually occurred. Talking to people at the protests, it became obvious that this was no accident. The culture of academic competition that U of T creates also extends to the way in which the university treats such tragedies. The fact that we had to congregate simply to find out if someone we knew had died by suicide is ridiculous.

I believe that the protests on Monday emphasized, more than anything, how many of us have been made to feel lost and alone because of the environment that U of T fosters. Of course, I don’t doubt that the administration mean well on some level. But the fact that the ‘academic rigour’ on which U of T prides itself has created a situation where we are made to put our own health at risk for the illusion of success can’t be ignored.

The protests, I believe, provided a necessary shock to U of T’s system. Of course, the aim is to work with the administration, not counter to it. But it first needs to acknowledge that this isn’t a funding issue — for all the sanctioned notices and abstracted notions of mental wellness, we need fundamental change from the administration. We need a detoxification that requires much more trust in the student body than the university currently vests.

As I put in my section of the speech that resulted from a collaborative effort between protesters and that was read to the Business Board on Monday, we need change on three fundamental levels. Firstly, we need an acknowledgement; we don’t need to publicize their names or situations but to deny the plight of these victims is to deny their existence. Secondly, we need a more accessible variety of mental health care, one that contains at least steps toward services like 24-hour counselling and guidelines for unaccommodating and harsh professors. Thirdly, and most importantly, we need a large-scale reframing of the way that U of T treats its students.

As we showed on Monday, we won’t stand to be pitted against each other anymore.

Arjun Kaul is a fifth-year Neuroscience, Cell & Molecular Biology, and English student at St. Michael’s College.

Disclosure: Kaul co-organized Monday’s protests.

If you or someone you know is in distress, you can call:

Canada Suicide Prevention Service phone available 24/7 at 1-833-456-4566

Thomas Rosica’s actions and excuses are disappointing

Despite his public apology, plagiarism allegations that have recently arisen against Toronto Catholic priest Thomas Rosica are serious and demand justice. Rosica, well known for his work in the city’s Roman Catholic community, has stepped down from his position on the board of directors at the University of St. Michael’s College. The priest alleges alleges the plagiarism was unintentional, and has expressed his regret for what he deems “errors.”

In the earliest article found to be plagiarized, two entire paragraphs were copied word for word from reporter Brian Murphy. It is difficult to believe that someone could unwittingly replicate such a substantial amount of writing from another person’s work without realizing it. Moreover, this was one of the many instances in which the priest has taken credit for another writer’s words. It is evident that Rosica is feigning innocence as an attempt to keep his reputation intact.

Rosica has been plagiarizing without any consequences for a little over a decade. He used others’ ideas in his pursuit to bolster his reputation as a distinguished member of the Catholic community. It is even possible that the plagiarized work aided the priest in winning some awards and honorary degrees that he has accepted over the years.

On a campus that denounces content theft, Rosica’s actions and excuses are disappointing. He provides a poor example to other academics and students. Therefore, it would be best that he no longer be affiliated with the University of Toronto. Rosica needs to be held accountable for his actions. Revoking the awards he received for his work in the Catholic community and the honorary degrees he received at U of T would be an appropriate penalty.

Agata Mociani is a first-year Humanities student at New College.

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Comment in Briefs: Week of March 4

Students react to SCSU’s refusal to ratify incoming executive, new building near Faculty of Law

A gross miscarriage of democracy for UTSC

There’s something deeply disturbing about the recent Scarborough Campus Students’ Union decision to not ratify the election win of Vice-President Operations-elect Rayyan Alibux. This decision has only served the UTSC community a gross miscarriage of democracy.

Perhaps I’m mistaken, but last I checked we’re not living in a dystopia — this isn’t Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World or George Orwell’s 1984. It’s imperative that instances of guilt by association be considered cautiously and not naively.

It does not follow from The Underground’ssnippet to the inference that Alibux engaged with harmful intent toward any individual of the trans community.

Saying “I hope this chat is never leaked” can be interpreted as an expression of concern toward something someone else said, because it could bring harm to another.

I don’t know Alibux and perhaps wouldn’t like him. I certainly would not if he persistently engaged in activities with the intent to harm others. However, as per the snippet shown, any guilty verdicts to harm others and labelling of transphobe are unfounded, exaggerated and extrapolated beyond reality.

While he may very well be transphobic or racist, we cannot accept biased speculation as proof of such claims. In lieu of evidence, it’s preposterous to refuse ratification based on tense interpersonal relationships that are far too emotionally invested to be consistent with professional workplace rules of conduct.

For the record, I’m not at UTSC and have no association whatsoever with any of the individuals involved. Observing from UTSG, I find the situation sickening and unbecoming of any Canadian political institution and its representatives.

If you’re not under the banner of democracy, then you’re outside of it. If you’re not under the law, then you’re above it. Either way, you’re acting outside and against democratic interests of student society. It’s a brazen attack on U of T’s democracy, and perpetrators must be held accountable and responsible for any and all damages.

The proposed School of Cities building is justified

Re: “U of T proposing new building near Faculty of Law, Music”

SHANNA HUNTER/THE VARSITY

The University of Toronto has announced plans to construct a new building at 90 Queen’s Park. The edifice will house the School of Cities, a research institute that approaches urban issues. This proposal has been met with both hope and disapproval from university students. It is important to consider the opportunities it will provide to members of the U of T community.

Much of the criticism is aimed at the structure’s appearance. Some have denounced it due to its ‘ugly’ contemporary design. However, it is arbitrary to decry a building that begins construction in 2020, simply because it does not have the same aesthetic appeal as the university’s more renowned establishments — many of which were erected in the nineteenth century.

It would be impossible to create a nine-storey structure that blends in with the older buildings in Queen’s Park Circle. This is due to the sheer size of the planned edifice in comparison to others, as well as the buildings’ age differences. The modern additions to UTSG pose no threat to the historical ones. The School of Cities’ architecture is designed with functionality in mind, which will ensure that it is practical and fulfills its intended purpose.

The new building’s recital hall, as well as its close proximity to the Faculty of Music, intrinsically link it to the music department. The Chief of University Planning, Gilbert Delgado, has taken into account the request for an interior passage between the building and the Faculty. This will allow musicians to transport instruments easily between the two facilities. This is proof that students’ requests are already being accommodated. As the venture moves forward, architects will continue taking advice from students.

We have the facts, so will U of T comply?

The 2019 Silence is Violence (SiV) report was thorough, wide-ranging, and, unfortunately, not shocking in the slightest. It revealed just how much students have suffered and continue to suffer, along with the little confidence that they have in Campus Police when it comes to reporting sexual harassment cases.

Although U of T has established a Sexual Violence Prevention and Support Centre to deal with reports of sexual misconduct, I’m pretty sure the SiV report was the first time most of us had ever heard of the centre. Nevertheless, the report has shown us that we still have a long way to go. That starts with the university prioritizing sexual violence as a central threat to student safety and health. It’s also about creating more systemic changes within both the U of T centre and the branches that work around it, including rehabilitation and protection for students dealing with this type of violence.

SiV also shed light on the number of students who were unable to differentiate between sexual violence and harmless interactions. Not enough is taught and said about sexual violence on campus, other than the very basic education on consent during frosh week.

The university must also delve deeper into different dimensions of sexual violence that include coercion, power imbalances, and intersectionality. It is important to consider how and why Indigenous, disabled, mentally ill, genderqueer, transgender, and queer persons reported the highest estimated numbers of sexual violence on campus.

It would not only be a disservice but also a dishonor to our student body if these numbers continue to rise or remain the way they are now.

Janine Alhadidi is a Political Science and Diaspora and Transnational Studies student at St. Michael’s College.

Let’s carefully consider the VUSAC residence rename proposal

In his novel Crabwalk, Nobel Laureate Günter Grass, himself disgraced by his teenage WWII service in the notoriously evil Waffen-SS, advised future generations that wherever there are grievances, one should confront issues directly instead of simply dismissing what’s difficult and uncomfortable. The concern is that, if we do dismiss unresolved matters, we forfeit control of the narrative at our peril, and often to those with perverse interests.

This is especially important today, given the recent emergence of nationalist populism, with venomous personalities like Faith Goldy in Toronto and Kevin Johnston in Mississauga, and, also at U of T, with the recent appearance of white nationalist posters on campus.

It’s in the best interests of society that the dark legacy of residential schools never be owned by nationalist populists, especially as they might misconstrue the removal of Egerton Ryerson’s name from landmarks as an attack on Canadian identity. This is how they derive an exclusivist sense of belonging, build their movement, and push their own twisted political agendas to indoctrinate others.

We shouldn’t shrug off the past. However burdensome it may be, it can still instruct us. Yes, Ryerson can still serve to instruct us, especially on how not to go about designing an educational system that ensures the wholesale and systematic annihilation of human cultures.

A solution is to keep Ryerson’s name while also providing comprehensive educational displays at the residence that inform students and the public about his true history.

Perhaps future residents of the college will take the duty upon themselves to learn that history and share it with others on campus so we never forget or repeat such shameful mistakes, which continue to haunt and blight Canada’s international reputation, however false, as a moral leader.

PC youth and party leadership are on the same page, at least for now

For most parties, policy conventions are typically inconsequential. While it is true that they often produce official election platforms, there is little that binds leaders to their promises, especially when they enter office. Thus, more than anything, conventions have become public relation performances in which parties can project unity, a strong leader, and the image of a diverse, open dialogue.

Nevertheless, policy conventions are often a good place to determine where party membership is, as it is rare that the tightly-controlled communications of leader takes a secondary role.

As part of an Ontario-wide program of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Campus Association (OPCCA), the South Regional Policy Conference will contribute to the understanding of OPCCA’s broader policy preferences, which will then, it seems, be brought to the attention of the party during the policy convention.

The policies adopted here don’t seem unusual, nor do they contradict the party’s current agenda as of yet. There was a particular focus on expanding transit service to Niagara, which seems to be the current position of the province, as it has begun to do so. The biggest decision that the government seems to be moving forward with is the provincial ‘takeover’ of the TTC, which appeared to draw divides among party members. The dispute, however, was less about the principle than it was about the financial cost. Mental health resolutions, the second topic of discussion, remained vague and difficult to dispute in and of themselves.

Thus, while there appears to be some minor disagreement, there is no indication that some sort of confrontation between the PC youth and party leadership will occur in the near future. Although, should the government continue in its current policy direction for postsecondary institutions, I would not be surprised if this outlook changes.

Sam Routley is a fourth-year Political Science, Philosophy, and History student. He is The Varsity’s UTSG Campus Politics Columnist.

Comment in Briefs: Week of January 28

An unacceptable mishap, especially for those applying to graduate school

Re: “Bug affected student GPAs on ACORN, U of T says”

To many of us, ACORN has become synonymous with technical difficulties. However, none may have as negative long-term consequences as ACORN’s newest technical mishap with many affected by a wrongful GPA calculation following the Fall 2018 semester.

I was surprised to log into ACORN early January to find that my 4.0 sessional GPA from the fall did not increase my cumulative GPA (CGPA). While site crashes during course enrolment are certain to occur, I expected ACORN to at least be a reliable calculator. And as a fourth-year student with several grad school applications looming just around corner, I submitted my transcripts with ACORN’s incorrectly calculated GPA with only a mild annoyance and confusion as to how a 4.0 could lead to absolutely no improvement to one’s CGPA.

It was only days later when I logged back into ACORN to see that my CGPA suddenly improved by 0.03. While this may not seem like much to many, small incremental differences in CGPA can be the deciding factor for many of us applying for graduate school. But now we will never know the degree to which this malfunction has affected our chances.

While frustration over U of T’s web services are often justified by the fact that the system needs to service such a large student population, this latest ACORN mishap will be costly to students through no fault of their own. Also, I expected the administration to inform students more broadly about the mishap beyond simply posting about it on social media, as many students may have failed to have received the news at all.

More work should be done to improve student web services to ensure that issues like these don’t arise again. Not getting into a class you wanted to take is one thing. But possibly not getting into grad school because of ACORN’s faulty calculations is unacceptable.

Yasaman Mohaddes is a fourth-year Political Science and Sociology student at St. Michael’s College.

Some U of T student unions have joined 75 other Canadian student unions in signing an open letter that protests Premier Doug Ford’s postsecondary reforms, which may cause them to lose a significant proportion of their revenue.

Myopically, the letter focuses on how valuable the unions themselves are, rather than the student-run programs that actually provide value. Consider the frequency of mismanagement or serious allegations of fraud committed by student unions, such as by those at U of T, the University of Ottawa, and Ryerson University, as well as poor voter participation in their elections. The reputation of these unions is not strong enough to justify concern for funding reduction.

The letter criticizes both the Ontario Student Assistance Program (OSAP) changes and the “opt-out” clause. Regarding the OSAP changes, the biggest difference is that grants are reduced for higher-income families and dependent students living at home. For low-income and independent students, the changes are negligible. Interest is now charged during the six-month grace period, but the cuts to tuition fees and incidental fees are significant compensations. Ultimately, the letter’s framing of the issue as a direct attack on low-income families is misleading, to say the least.

The bulk of the letter is focused on the “opt-out” clause, called the Student Choice Initiative. Programs that support health and safety are exempt from the clause. The letter disingenuously states that these programs are at risk, which amounts to nothing more than fear-mongering.

Even if we are to ignore the misrepresentation of the policy, the letter fails to justify student unions as being worth their fees. A more suitable approach would have been to focus on the value provided by student groups that may disappear, without using hyperbolic language and misleading readers about what the changes actually are.

George McKeown is a fifth-year PhD student in the Department of Chemistry.

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Canada’s racism: I feel scared and sad

Re: “White nationalist posters found around UTSG”

Racist posters from a white nationalist group were found around UTSG on Monday. SHANNA HUNTER/THE VARSITY

I am a first-generation Canadian citizen. I have always thought that, on the question of multiculturalism, Canadians were at a more respectable level than the Americans. I used to think that racism was not something that was prevalent in Canada, because I didn’t explicitly witness it.

However, recent aberrations such as these white nationalist posters around UTSG have made me rethink my conception of Canada as a whole. Sometimes, I feel scared to see such visceral dislike of all people who are not white.

Sometimes, I feel sad for those responsible for the posters. They fail to see that they are immigrants, just like the people they abhor, and are therefore also not entitled to Canada. The only ones who can truly claim this land are Indigenous peoples.

Someone pointed out to me that these posters are placed around to draw media coverage and attention to these organizations, which in turn helps to recruit like-minded thinkers. This makes for a complicated picture. On the one hand, we should bring attention to these incidents in order to identify the existence of explicit racism, but on the other hand, we risk inadvertently strengthening racist causes.

This incident is especially saddening because U of T, and Toronto more broadly, is so multiculturally rich that I had thought that most, if not all, people here would not agree with such an ideology. And yet, here we are. There are people who feel emboldened enough to post these blatantly racist posters to stir people’s emotions and play with their notion of being Canadian.

I appreciate that University of Toronto Students’ Union representatives have spoken out against this incident, but I don’t know what more can be done about it. Freedom of speech exists in Canada and some may not consider the posters to be hate speech. For now, we can only be aware of these incidents and not let them shake us.

We have all worked hard to be here. No one should feel superior or inferior to any ethnicity, race, religion, or otherwise in Canada. This is what multiculturalism means: respect and acceptance for all.